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US 9,317,238 B2Granted
Image forming apparatus to support wi-fi direct and method of wi-fi direct connecting therein
AssigneeSamsung Electronics Co., Ltd.
InventorHyun-wook Park
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An image forming apparatus supporting a Wi-Fi Direct receives a request for a Wi-Fi Direct connection from an external wireless device, and allows to establish the Wi-Fi Direct connection between the image forming apparatus and the external wireless device by using device information that is previously stored with respect to wireless devices that were previously Wi-Fi Direct connected to the image forming apparatus.
Claims13
An image forming apparatus supporting Wi-Fi Direct, the image forming apparatus comprising:
- a wireless interface unit to receive a request for a Wi-Fi Direct connection from an external wireless device;
- a memory unit to store device information about wireless devices that were previously Wi-Fi Direct connected to the image forming apparatus including MAC addresses and Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol, DHCP, client identifiers of the wireless devices that were previously Wi-Fi Direct connected to the image forming apparatus, the DHCP client identifiers being coded by the wireless devices and sent to the image forming apparatus in a DHCP request data packet;
- and
- a central processing unit to determine whether device information of the external wireless device that has requested the Wi-Fi Direct connection is stored in the memory unit, based on the stored device information,
- wherein when the external wireless device that has requested the Wi-Fi Direct connection is determined as corresponding to the stored device information, enabling, by the central processing unit, the Wi-Fi Direct connection between the image forming apparatus and the external wireless device via the wireless interface unit without a user input for Wi-Fi Protected Setup, WPS, via a user interface unit of the image forming apparatus.
2 more elements
An image forming apparatus supporting Wi-Fi Direct, comprising:
- a print engine to conduct a printing operation;
- a memory unit to store device information about wireless devices that were previously Wi-Fi Direct connected to the image forming apparatus, the stored device information including MAC addresses and Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol, DHCP, client identifiers of the wireless devices that were previously Wi-Fi Direct connected to the image forming apparatus, the DHCP client identifiers being coded by the wireless devices and sent to the image forming apparatus in a DHCP request data packet;
- a first wireless interface unit to connect to an access point, AP, of a network infrastructure;
- a second wireless interface unit to receive a request for Wi-Fi Direct connection from an external wireless device;
- a central processing unit to determine whether device information of the external wireless device that has requested Wi-Fi Direct connection is stored in the memory unit, based on the stored device information;
- a soft AP unit to act as an AP when a Wi-Fi Direct connection is established;
- and
- DHCP server unit to allocate an IP address to the external wireless device that is Wi-Fi Direct connected to the image forming apparatus,
- wherein, if the external wireless device that has requested a Wi-Fi Direct connection is determined as corresponding to the stored device information, enabling, by the central processing unit, the Wi-Fi Direct connection between the image forming apparatus and the external wireless device via the second wireless interface unit without a user input for Wi-Fi Protected Setup, WPS, via a user interface unit of the image forming apparatus.
6 more elements
A method of performing a Wi-Fi Direct connection in an image forming apparatus, the method comprising:
- receiving a request for the Wi-Fi Direct connection from an external wireless device;
- determining whether device information of the external wireless device that has requested the Wi-Fi Direct connection is stored, based on device information about wireless devices that were previously Wi-Fi Direct connected to the image forming apparatus which is stored in advance;
- enabling the Wi-Fi Direct connection if the external wireless device that has requested the Wi-Fi Direct connection is determined as a device corresponding to the stored device information without a user input for Wi-Fi Protected Setup, WPS, via a user interface unit of the image forming apparatus if the external wireless device corresponds to the stored device information,
- wherein the stored device information comprise MAC addresses and Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol, DHCP, client identifiers of the wireless devices that were previously Wi-Fi Direct connected to the image forming apparatus, the DHCP client identifiers being coded by the wireless devices and sent to the image forming apparatus in a DHCP request data packet.
1 more element
An image forming apparatus to support Wi-Fi Direct, comprising:
- a wireless interface unit to receive a request for a current Wi-Fi Direct connection from an external wireless device;
- and
- a central processing unit to determine whether there was a previous Wi-Fi Direct connection with the external wireless device based on device information including MAC addresses and Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol, DHCP, client identifiers of the wireless devices that were previously Wi-Fi Direct connected to the image forming apparatus, the DROP client identifiers being coded by the wireless devices and sent to the image forming apparatus in a DHCP request data packet, and to establish the current Wi-Fi Direct connection with the external wireless device according to a determination without a user input for Wi-Fi Protected Setup, WPS, via a user interface unit of the image forming apparatus, to receive one of a command and data according to the established current Wi-Fi Direct connection, and to perform a printing operation using a print engine according to the received one of the command and the data.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.